Abstract

These clips from the 1932 Nazi propaganda film Hitler über Deutschland [Hitler over Germany] documented the Nazi Party leader’s 16-day cross-country campaign in July 1932, just ahead of the pivotal Reichstag elections on July 31. It marked Hitler’s third national barnstorming tour by airplane, as he clearly wanted to kindle the same attention-grabbing buzz that had accompanied his famous aerial campaign prior to the April presidential elections. Intertitles underscored the physical and psychological stamina that such marathon travel required, as well as the large crowds that Hitler’s appearances attracted. No German politician had previously dared to undertake such a feat, one intertitle claimed, and several subsequent passages continued to emphasize the danger of the journey, as well as its strain. Hitler über Deutschland demonstrated the National Socialists’ embrace of new technologies, even as it also, paradoxically, included nostalgic depictions of milkmaids, folk costumes, and rural landscapes that evoked a romanticized past. The film premiered in Munich on October 23, 1932, just two weeks before another fateful Reichstag election on November 6.

NSDAP Propaganda Film Hitler über Deutschland (1932)

Source

Hitler over Germany. Images from the Führer's Propaganda Flight before the Elections on March 5, 1933.
Intertitles:

This third flight across Germany by the Führer and the two that preceded it were a work of national education of such enormous proportions as had never been seen before in the history of political propaganda. It was a self-imposed challenge to the utmost capacity of both a physical and mental nature, which no one before Adolf Hitler had dared to set themselves.
This film aims to convey a piece of this commitment, but also of this experience and this awakening of the nation, to the German people.
In 16 days and nights: 50 meetings, 8000 km by plane, 4000 km by car, 3 million listeners
The achievement of one man: Adolf Hitler
Shortly after 8 am, the three-engine Rohrbach D 1720 takes off for the Führer's third flight across Germany.
Tilsit. 400,000 East Prussians had gathered in the city, which was decorated with flags. They came from as far away as the Memel region, traveling in trucks, special trains and special steamboats.
Hitler: "Look at present-day Germany, see the catastrophe and recognize the forces that really exist today, and then make up your mind as a German man and woman and don't be half-hearted and cowardly!"
And during the night, the journey continued to Gumbinnen to 50,000 further East Prussians.
Day 2: To Lötzen at a speed of 100 km per hour [footage shot from driving car]
Twenty thousand Masurian peasants left the fields to hear the Führer.
Driving through the Masurian battlefields of 1914.
Commemorating the dead at the heroes' cemetery at Hohenstein
Parade! Storm troop after storm troop, standard after standard, that's how East Prussia's farmers and laborers, among them 5,000 men from the Danzig SA, march past the Führer.
The factory is closed today; its entire workforce is marching in the SA parade today.
The SA of the future: the Hitler Youth
And finally, the grenadiers of East Prussia: the SS
The people's enthusiasm is boundless
And now the Fuhrer speaks to the 150,000 people of Königsberg.
Day 5: Back into battle!
Schneidemühl: 40,000 from the border region – Kottbus: 50,000 workers and farmers – Stralsund, 2 a.m.: 25,000 in the pouring rain
And on to the 30,000 farmers in Lüneburg and at night to Bremen, where there are another 60,000.
Day 10: Heading for the Ruhr region.
Here, too, we see the image that announces the people's awakening everywhere: 120,000 in the stadium in Elberfeld.
[...]
Hitler: "I declare that if you fulfill your duty, you will personally have the feeling of reward, in that you will be able to say of yourself in the most decisive hour of the German nation and its destiny: I, too, joined the fight back then.”
Heading to the 70,000 waiting in Nuremberg
The final night flight to Munich
Like the fire that the Führer ignited in millions of hearts during these days, the torches of the Munich SA and SS men now glow symbolically towards the star-studded sky
On the next day, the swastika banners went up, to herald the victory of the fight, faith and will! 13,752,777 votes for the National Socialists. 24 hours later, the Führer issued the new slogan: The fight continues until the final victory.
"We all belong together for life and death, and nothing in this world can tear us apart."
"The people have come together across all classes and ranks in our movement. This is no longer a party, this is the people!
"Our movement will only come to an end on the day that it becomes the German nation."

 

Source: Hitler über Deutschland, dir. Alfons Brümmer, NSDAP Hauptabteilung, 1932. Bundesarchiv Filmarchiv Filmwerk ID: 1248 https://digitaler-lesesaal.bundesarchiv.de/en/video/1248/666746

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